Old/New Testament

The people of Judah go to Egypt

43 Jeremiah finished telling the people the Lord's message to them. He told them everything that the Lord their God had sent him to tell them. ² Then Hoshaiah's son Azariah and Kareah's son Johanan and some other proud men said to Jeremiah, ‘You are speaking lies! The Lord our God has not sent you to say to us, “You must not go to Egypt to live there.” ³ You are telling us what Neriah's son Baruch wants you to say. He wants to hurt us. He wants the soldiers from Babylon to kill us, or to take us as prisoners to Babylon.’

⁴ So Kareah's son Johanan, all the other army officers and all the other people did not obey the Lord's command. They refused to stay in Judah. ⁵ Instead, Johanan and all the officers led the people away. Those were the people who had returned from all the nations where their enemies had taken them as prisoners. They had returned to their homes in Judah. ⁶ Now the army officers led them away. They also took the men, women and children that Captain Nebuzaradan had allowed to remain with Gedaliah. They included the king's daughters. (Gedaliah was Ahikam's son and Shaphan's grandson.) They took the prophet Jeremiah and Neriah's son Baruch with them.

⁷ The people went to Egypt because they did not obey the Lord. They went as far as the city of Tahpanhes.

⁸ When they arrived in Tahpanhes, the Lord spoke to Jeremiah. ⁹ He said, ‘Choose some large stones and take them to Pharaoh's palace that is here in Tahpanhes. Bury the stones under the path at the entrance of the palace. Do it while the people of Judah are watching you. ¹⁰ Then say to the people, “The Lord Almighty, Israel's God, says this: I will call for my servant, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, to come here. He will put his throne on the path over these stones that I have hidden. They will put up a royal tent for him to sit under. ¹¹ He will come here and he will attack Egypt.

¹² He will burn the temples of Egypt's gods with fire. He will burn their gods or he will carry them away. He will take everything that he wants from Egypt. He will return home in good health. ¹³ He will knock down the pillars of the temple where people worship their sun god. He will destroy all the temples of Egypt's gods.” ’

God will punish the people of Judah

44 The Lord spoke to Jeremiah about the people of Judah who were now living in Egypt. They were living in Migdol, Tahpanhes, Memphis and places in the south part of Egypt. ² This was the Lord's message to them:

‘The Lord Almighty, Israel's God, says, “You saw the great trouble that I sent to the people of Jerusalem and all the towns of Judah. Their towns have become heaps of stones and nobody lives in them. ³ That happened because of the wicked things that the people did in those places. They offered sacrifices to other gods. They worshipped gods that they never knew before. You and your ancestors did not know those gods either. That made me very angry. ⁴ Many times I sent my servants the prophets to speak to them. They warned them, ‘Do not do this disgusting thing that the Lord hates!’ ⁵ But the people there did not listen to my message. They refused to obey me. They did not stop doing wicked things. They did not stop offering sacrifices to other gods. ⁶ So I became very angry with the people of Judah and Jerusalem. I sent them terrible trouble, like a fire that burned their towns and their streets. That is why their towns have become heaps of stones, as they still are today.” 

⁷ Now the Lord God Almighty, Israel's God, says, “You are causing more trouble for yourselves. Why are you doing that? All the men, women, children and babies will disappear from Judah. None of your people will remain alive. ⁸ You continue to make me angry because of the things that you are doing. You are offering sacrifices to the gods of Egypt, where you now live. As a result, you will destroy yourselves. The people of all the other nations will use your name as a curse. They will all laugh at you. ⁹ Do not forget about all the wicked things that your ancestors did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. I punished them, as well as their kings and their kings' wives. And I punished you and your wives too. ¹⁰ Even now your people are still proud. They have not respected my authority. They have not obeyed the laws and commands that I gave to you and to your ancestors.”

¹¹ So the Lord Almighty, Israel's God, says, “Listen to me! I will certainly cause you to have great trouble. I will destroy all Judah's people. ¹² I will remove the people who remained in Judah and who decided to come here to live in Egypt. They will all die here. War or famine will kill them. All of them will die here in Egypt, important people and ordinary people. Other people will think that they are disgusting. They will insult them. They will use their name as a curse, because God has cursed them. ¹³ I will punish the people who have come to live in Egypt. War, famine or disease will kill them, in the way that I punished the people of Jerusalem. ¹⁴ None of the people who remained in Judah and who came to live here in Egypt will escape. They will not remain alive to return to Judah. They may want very much to return, but only a few will be able to run away and go home.” ’

¹⁵ A large crowd of Judah's people listened to Jeremiah. They came from the places where they now lived in the north and the south of Egypt. Some men were there who knew that their wives were offering sacrifices to other gods. Those men and their wives said to Jeremiah, ¹⁶ ‘We do not believe that your message really comes from the Lord. ¹⁷ So we will continue to do what we have promised to do. We will make sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven. We will pour out drink offerings to her.^[a] That is what our ancestors, our kings and our leaders did when we lived in Jerusalem and in the other towns of Judah. When we did that, we had plenty of food to eat. We enjoyed a good life and we had no troubles. ¹⁸ But since we stopped offering sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven, we have not had those good things. War and famine have been killing our people.’

¹⁹ The women said, ‘It is true that we offered sacrifices and drink offerings to the Queen of Heaven. We also made cakes that were like her image. But our husbands knew what we were doing and they helped us.’

²⁰ Then Jeremiah said this to all those men and women who had answered him:

²¹ ‘The Lord saw everything that you were doing. You must surely realize that! He knew about the things that you, your ancestors, your kings, your leaders and all the people were doing. He remembered all the sacrifices that you offered to other gods in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. ²² Finally, he had to punish you for the wicked and disgusting things that you were doing. Because of that, your land has become an empty place, like a desert. Its towns are heaps of stones where nobody lives. People use its name as a curse. ²³ That happened because you have offered sacrifices to other gods. You have done many sins against the Lord. You have refused to obey him. You have not obeyed his laws, his teaching or his commands. That is why all this trouble has happened to you now.’

²⁴ Then Jeremiah said this to all the people, including the women:

‘Listen to the Lord's message, all you people of Judah who are now living in Egypt. ²⁵ The Lord God Almighty, Israel's God, says, “You and your wives have certainly done the things that you said you would do. You said, ‘We will continue to do what we have promised to do. We will make sacrifices to the Queen of Heaven. We will pour out drink offerings to her.’ So do all those things that you promised to do!”

²⁶ But listen to the Lord's message to all you people of Judah who are living in Egypt. The Lord says, “I now promise this to you, with the authority of my own name. None of you who live in Egypt will ever use my name again when you make a promise. You will not say, ‘I promise you I will do this, as surely as the Lord God lives.’ ²⁷ Listen to me! I will choose to hurt you and not to help you. War or famine will kill all the people of Judah who are living in Egypt. None of them will remain alive. ²⁸ But a few of them will escape death and return to Judah from Egypt. They will be very few people. Then all the people of Judah who came to live in Egypt will know who speaks the truth. Do I speak the truth, or do they speak the truth? I do!”

²⁹ The Lord also says, “I will show you that I will surely punish you in this place. I will tell you something that will soon happen. Then you will know that my promise to punish you will certainly become true. ³⁰ I tell you now that I will put Hophra, king of Egypt, under the power of his enemies, who want to kill him. That is the same thing that I did to King Zedekiah of Judah. I put him under the power of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, who wanted to kill him.” ’

God's message to Baruch

45 Baruch wrote down on a scroll the words that Jeremiah told him to write. That happened in the fourth year that Josiah's son, Jehoiakim, ruled Judah as king. At that time, Jeremiah said to Baruch, ² ‘The Lord, Israel's God, says this to you, Baruch: ³ You said, “I have terrible trouble! I have a lot of pain, and the Lord has also made me very sad. I am so upset that I have become very weak. I cannot rest at all.” 

⁴ But the Lord says this to you, Baruch: “I will soon knock down the things that I have built. I will pull out of the ground the things that I have planted. I will do that everywhere in the land. ⁵ If you want to become famous and important, do not hope for that to happen. I will send great trouble to all the people on the earth. But I promise that I will keep your life safe, wherever you go.” That is what the Lord says.’

5 Every leader of God's priests comes from among the people. That special priest's work is to serve God on behalf of God's people. He offers gifts and sacrifices to God, so that God will forgive the people's sins. ² That priest himself may often do wrong things, because he is weak and human. As a result, he understands other people who make mistakes. He can be kind to people who do wrong things. ³ But, because he himself does wrong things, he must offer sacrifices to God on behalf of himself, as well as on behalf of the people.

⁴ Nobody decides for himself to become a leader of the priests. God himself must choose him. That is how Aaron became a priest.^[a]

⁵ It is the same with Christ. He did not choose himself to be God's special priest. He did not choose to make himself important like that. God chose him. God showed that Christ was very important. God said to him:

⁶ And in another place in the Bible God says this:

⁷ When Jesus Christ lived on earth as a man, he often prayed to God. He asked God to help him. He prayed strongly and he cried loudly with many tears. He knew that God could save him from death. And God listened to Jesus when he prayed, because Jesus served God.^[d]

⁸ Jesus is God's Son. But he still had trouble and pain. In that way, he learned to obey God completely. ⁹ As a result, Jesus became the person who can save everyone who obeys him. Because of Jesus, God forgives their sins for ever. ¹⁰ God has chosen Jesus to be his special priest in the same way that Melchizedek was.

We must be careful that we do not go away from Christ

¹¹ We have a lot more to say to you about these things. But you are slow to understand things. As a result, it is difficult to explain any more to you now. ¹² After all this time as believers in Jesus, you ought to be teachers. Instead of that, you still need someone to teach you the first lessons about God's message. You have become like babies, who need milk instead of proper food. ¹³ Anyone who still thinks like a baby does not yet understand God's message about what is right. It is as if they are still drinking only milk. ¹⁴ People who have grown up eat proper food. In the same way, people who have been believers for a long time should understand more about God's message. They should have learned about what is good and about what is bad. They should know the difference between those.